This invention relates to housings for splices in electrical cables, including telephone cables, and in particular, to a new and improved housing suitable for handling two or more cables and protecting the splice from moisture and mechanical damage.
Electrical cables such as telephone cables and power cables are interconnected by joining or splicing the individual conductors of the two cables. The integrity of the cable is breached at the ends exposing the conductors for the splices and it is desirable to provide some type of electrical insulation and mechanical protection for the splices and the cable ends.
One such housing in widespread use today is shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,934,076 and 4,053,704. Another form of enclosure is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,337,374.
In these prior art devices, cables are spliced in side-by-side configuration and inserted into a one piece or two piece housing which is charged with grease or other encapsulating material.
Another style of housing for cable splices utilizes a central cylindrical sleeve with tapered end sections either formed with the sleeve or separately, with the splice positioned within the sleeve and with the sleeve being filled by the encapsulating material after the housing has been closed. Some forms of this type of housing are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,836,694; 3,895,180; and 3,992,569.
A housing for enclosing the splices of three cables is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,176,245, and housings for enclosing the splices of four cables are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,147,338; 3,325,591; and 4,029,896.
These prior art housings provide for enclosing the splice or splices of a predetermined number of cables. Also, a number of them provide for handling cables of a particular size. While the housing may do a satisfactory job for electrically insulating and mechanically protecting the splice, it does require manufacturing and maintaining a stock of housing components of various sizes for use with the various types of splices encountered in the field.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a new and improved cable splice housing which can be utilized with one to four cables and which will provide the desired electrical and mechanical protection for the resulting splice or splices. A further object is to provide such a housing which can be utilized with cables of various sizes.
It is a particular object of the invention to provide such a housing which will provide sealing for the encapsulating material when used with various numbers of cables, and one which is readily adapted by the worker in the field for use with a specific number of cables and with cables having specific positions.
Other objects, advantages, features and results will more fully appear in the course of the following description.